


freedom is just another word

by egmcgregors



Category: Triple Frontier (2019)
Genre: F/M, Marriage, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-12
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-18 22:00:23
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29989431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/egmcgregors/pseuds/egmcgregors
Summary: frankie morales must learn to navigate life outside of the one he’s known for more than two decades when he moves to a small, quiet neighborhood in an attempt assimilate into civilian life. all the familiar faces, all the structure, all the horrors -- none of it exists inside the suburban, white-picket fence fantasy he’s begun to shape for himself. hours are long, days are painful, and he doesn’t think he’s ever going to be able to do it -- at least, not until he sees her. her, the married woman in the home across from his, living the same white-picket fantasy he is. her, the woman who gets it. her.
Relationships: Francisco "Catfish" Morales & Original Female Character(s), Francisco "Catfish" Morales/Nameless OC, Francisco "Catfish" Morales/You, frankie morales/reader
Kudos: 1





	freedom is just another word

Sometimes, Frankie could not stand himself. Really, despise himself. It got away from him, happened quicker than he could control. He would stand and peer in the mirror, and then he would notice the way his hair curled beneath his trucker cap, overgrown and untamed, and it would spread like wildfire, just like that. It was relentless and unforgiving, and he couldn’t understand it. He just did it, before he knew why he did.

He stands behind the window, peering out from behind sheer curtains. He makes sure he’s out of sight, knows it’s not a good thing he’s doing, but he still lets his digits hold the fabric back so he can look.

Across the street sets a house identical to his. To be fair, nearly all the houses in the cul-de-sac were; it was what he had found so appealing about the newly built area. It was house after house based on the same blueprint, differing only in shades and the way they were decorated on holidays.

Oh, and the people who resided in them—that was a big difference. They were big families, like the one down the street who had two dogs and two sets of twins, one pair eleven and the next three, and then there were small ones, like the people across the street. They were married two years ago and had bought their house exactly a year before Frankie had bought his. That’s what the woman had told him, at least, when he had been unpacking his boxes last week. It was an innocuous interaction that had been burning at him all week. She was pretty.

She is pretty, actually.

The object his eyes train onto is her, as she’s bent over and gripping the window seal. Her cheeks are flushed and her mouth hangs agape, and her husband fucks roughly into her. Frankie stands there like some kind of fucking peeping Tom watching it all, too.

It’s late, two am probably, so he supposes they didn’t think anyone would be awake. The town shuts down around eleven pm, and everything gets quiet about nine, so it’s a fair assumption, but he can’t sleep. He hasn’t been watching for long, just enough to note the way she looks. He wants to move away, but he can’t seem to do that either.

Her husband grabs a hand full of her hair and he pulls her back, exposing more of her body to the neighborhood. Frankie swallows roughly, gazing at her breasts, watching the way they bounce with each one of the man’s thrust. She reaches around and struggles to find something to grasp onto as her husband fucks her, and Frankie feels his cock begin to stir alive in his boxers.

He steps back into the darkness of his room, ashamed. The desire that pools in his belly is coupled with a high dosage of guilt, and he tries to ignore the way his cock feels in his boxers as he climbs back into bed. Knows that if he fucks his hand to the thought of her, it’ll eat at him for days and God knows he doesn’t need anymore of that.

Then, as the ache doesn’t immediately go away, he begins to think he’ll have found a reason for it if he does, that hatred. It burns and burns away, and there’s no basis for it, so if he touches himself, he’ll know why.

Frankie presses his eyes closed, so tight white shapes begin to form before him. He just wants to sleep. He will sleep.

Frankie turns on his side and ignores the way his cock begs to be touched, but he still thinks of her. It’ll be reason enough to hate himself in the morning, when his hands shake because he’s drunk too many cups of coffee and made himself jittery just to feel alive.

———

“Frankie?”

Frankie turns his head, and he sees her. She’s got that innocuous smile plastered on her face again as she waves at him.

She begins making her way down the isle at a decent pace, and he can’t pretend he hasn’t heard or seen her now, even though he wants to. He doesn’t mean to be rude, but he can’t shake the way she looked last night, and he’s not sure he wants to, either.

“Hi,” he nods in her direction.

“I haven’t seen you since you moved in. How are you enjoying town?”

She pulls her cart to the other side of the aisle, making room for passing carts.

“Oh,” he smiles, “I’m just settling in, is all. It’s nice, this town. Quiet.”

Suddenly, and without much reason, he’s begun to feel self conscious about the objects in his cart. A loaf of wonder bread, peanut butter, jelly, Hamburger Helper, a few microwave dinners. Given his placement next to the Cap’n Crunch now, too, he’s bet she thinks he’s not much of a cook.

He watches the way she glances down to where his eyes were, on the cart that screams single-hood and not knowing what the fuck he’s doing, and all he can do is offer a grin. She doesn’t seem to judge him, looking back up at him with the same look she had when she spotted him.

“I’m glad I ran into you, actually, because I wanted to invite you over for dinner tomorrow night. The whole neighborhood has begun a “summer-kick-off” sort of thing because so many of us are new to the area. What do you say?”

“Oh, uh.” He rubs the back of his neck, trying to muster up a reason why he absolutely could not, but there’s no place he can hide for a night. He doesn’t know this town very well yet.

Fuck.

“Yeah, I could do that,” he says. “What time?”

“Around—“

Someone attempts to move past both of them, cutting her off. Frankie pulls his cart closer to shelves on his side, and they both mutter soft apologies.

She continues after the person makes their way through, “Around six.”

“Should I bring anything?”

She shakes her head. “No, just yourself. Maybe a friend if you want, but it’s not required.”

He wishes he had a friend so he wouldn’t have to go.

“Okay,” he nods. His eyes shift ahead and she gets the hint.

“Well,” she starts again, “I’ll see you tomorrow night then?”

He nods. “Yeah, tomorrow night.”

She nods, putting both hands on her cart. As she begins to push forward and as he grabs the cereal off the shelf, he hears his name fall of her lips again. She turns back, smiling widely.

“Yeah?” His eyebrows perk.

“Don’t get the meatloaf in that brand. It’s gross.”

“Oh,” he notes, lips turning downwards into an observant frown. “Thanks.”

When he looks up again, she’s rounded the corner. He notes the way air fills his lungs again because of her absence. He also notices how, suddenly, the objects in his shopping cart doesn't seem so bad. He even lets himself smile at her joke as he leans down to grab another too-sugary-to-be good for him cereal.

Frankie pushes his cart forward in the same direction hers has gone without really thinking about it. The frozen food section of the store is four aisles away, but he sees her looking at the array of chips two aisles ahead. He makes his way to her.

“What do you recommend in that brand?”

She jolts.

“Oh, I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“No,” she waves him off, laughing lightly. “It’s okay, I just didn’t expect you to follow me.”

He feels it, the beginning traces of self-hatred. What a fool he is, he begins to think, but then she leans into her own cart and produces her options. She doesn’t look offended or scared at all. The feeling dissipates slowly.

“I’m partial to the chicken nuggets and the chicken alfredo, but I don’t know if you like chicken as much as I do.”

“I do. I’m not much of a cooker; it’s one of the few things I can manage not to screw up, yanno?”

She laughs. “Yeah, I do unfortunately. All of this,” she motions to the food in her cart. “My husband grills it. He’s tried to teach me, but I’m hopeless when it comes to cooking. Your cart appealed to my heart more than you know.”

“Oh, well,” he laughs too, heat tinting his cheeks for no reason. He wants the ground to swallow him up, but at the same time, he doesn’t; he wants to say here and talk to her about everything, even though the thoughts of her naked and exposed flash guilty through his mind. Even though his cheeks are tint because of her. Even though she makes him nervous and he forgets to breathe regularly around her, and he knows this is an irresponsible formation of a crush growing inside of him. Maybe even because of it.

Can’t really fuck up something you can’t have, can you?

“Um, thank you again,” he says. “I’ll let you get back to your shopping.”

She smiles. “Yeah, any time, neighbor. What am I good for, if not warning another failed cook about the dangers of frozen meatloaf?”

He grins widely and nods in her direction, dismissing himself. She turns back to her chips.

Frankie goes to the frozen food aisle and he puts back the meatloaf, and grabs six of the chicken nuggets and six of the chicken alfredos.

Even though he knows he likes the meatloaf in that brand, he doesn’t mind putting it back for her. Doesn’t seem so appealing anymore, now that she’s denounced it.

This is probably worse than masturbating to her, he thinks, but something about it is light enough not to invoke that bitter, relentless hatred. The loneliness outweighs it.

As he makes his way to check out, he doesn’t even mind the way his mind thinks again and again about her smile. He thinks more about it than the way she looked in the window, and his fingers beat merrily on the steering wheel on the way home, still thinking about it.

He feels great. That is, until he pulls into the cul-de-sac and he sees his wife standing on the porch of his house.

“Fuck,” he mutters. He pulls into the driveway and before he’s even turned off the engine, she’s making her way over to him.

He rolls down the window, narrowing his eyes against the sun that’s begun to fall.

“Frankie,” she groans, stepping up to the vehicle. He sees the white papers in her hands, remembers he must put “soon to be ex” in front of “wife” now.

“Are you here to harp on me about the papers?”

“No, Francisco, I’m here to bring you a welcoming gift. Of course I’m here to harp on you about the _fucking papers_.” She holds them up. “It’s been months.”

“I know.”

He puts his hands out, trying to placate her. It only makes it worse.

“Sign them, Frankie. I’m not leaving until we’re divorced **_on paper._** ”

“What’s the rush?” he spits out. “Getting married to someone else soon?”

“If I was, it’d be none of your business, would it?”

He sighs through his nose, ire that only she can rise in him bubbling up. He turns off the engine of the truck and opens the door.

“Help me with the groceries and I will,” he tells her. She looks at him doubtingly, but compiles, taking two bags in her hand and he takes three. As he makes his way up the steps, he sees her, the neighbor, pulling into the street. He turns away immediately and closes the door behind him abruptly.

“Just set them on the counter,” he directs his wife and she does so. She also sits the papers on the counter, too.

“This is nice, Frankie.”

“Thanks.”

He sets his bags on the counter next to hers, and he picks up the pen she’s brought with the paper. She knows he doesn’t think about things like pens and pencils until he needs them. He signs his name quickly and places the pen back on the counter, moving to unbag his food.

“Finished,” he tells her evenly.

“Thank you,” she tells him. She gathers the papers up and peers down at them. Finalized. Finished. Over. Five years of dating, two years of being engaged, and a little over a year of marriage, all down the drain.

He tries not to think about it as he puts the frozen dinners away, but it’s kind of hard when she’s standing there, reminding him.

“What?” he glances back at her, midway between putting the next box into the freezer and grabbing another.

She frowns. “You look awful, Francisco.”

Just as lovely as ever.

“Vanessa, I don’t want to bicker with you. We don’t have to do that anymore.”

“Don’t get mean with me.”

“You’re the one who made the three hour drive down here to end this, babe,” he points out, returning to the groceries. “I did it, I signed them.”

“I tried to make it work—“

“I know!” he shouts, and he watches as she flinches. He doesn’t know why she does that; he’s never hit her and his yelling has only begun to make an appearance in their interactions because he doesn’t know how else to communicate to her that he knows, goddamn he knows.

She swallows, holding back tears. With a softer sigh, he puts the bag in his hands on the counter and walks over to her. He wraps her in his embrace and she molds into him, staining the fabric of his shirt.

“I know, baby,” he whispers quietly into her ear. Without thinking, he presses a kiss to her lips, just something to console her the way he always did.

She doesn’t act surprised, and she kisses him again. Frankie lets her, and before he knows it, she’s undoing the button of his jeans. He pulls back from her, resting his forehead on hers, taking this in. They haven’t had sex in a few months and he hasn’t slept with anyone at all since. Last night’s incident made him all too aware of how long it has been, of how much he needs this.

His fingers are nimble, pushing her against the wall dividing the living room and kitchen and tugging her underwear down.

They kiss each other, and he knows the way their lips will looked bruised and the way her hair will be messed up because it’s where his fingers always seem to find when they have sex. Knows all the ways this will go, but the slide into her still takes him to surprise, and he winces at the sensation.

“You're not wearing a condom,” she panics.

“It’s okay.” He stills himself in her, pulling back to focus on the conversation. “I got...yanno. Clipped.”

“Oh,” she says. He thinks he can sense some sort of sadness within her but he doesn’t know why. They have a kid, Sebastian. She wanted two, a girl and a boy, he knows, but they’re divorced. He did it _because_ they’re divorced.

“Can I keep going?” he asks, brows raising.

She nods, “Yeah.”

He thrusts his hips up into her in a familiar way, and he comes quicker than usual. As he does, he grunts into her neck and she pats down his unruly curls and he knows this won’t be any good for his sense of self later, but it feels good now. He loves her still and he thinks she might love him a bit too, even if she told him she didn’t, that no part of her had anything left for him.

He pulls out of her and sets her down on the ground, pointing her in the direction of the bathroom as he wipes himself off with a cloth he finds on the counter.

Frankie puts away the rest of the groceries, and by the time she’s done cleaning up, he’s preparing himself one of those tv dinners.

“Well,” she says, as she enters the room again. “I guess I’ll see you.”

“Yeah,” he says, nodding his head. “Soon? I’ve got Seb a bed and a room for himself. You can go look if you want, it’s just up the stairs and down the hall. Next to my room.”

“Frankie, I don’t know.”

“Vanessa, he’s my kid, too. I miss him.”

“He can stay for the day, but he can’t spend the night. You scare him, Frankie.”

“I can’t help those,” he says. She always does this, brings this up, and the worse part is that he knows she’s right.

“Frankie, he doesn’t understand your nightmares.”

“Well, that makes two of us.”

She doesn’t find that funny. He didn’t really think she would.

“Get help and we’ll talk about overnights.”

The microwave behind him beeps. He turns towards it and takes the dinner out of it.

“Bye, Francisco,” she tells him and he waves at her, not bothering to turn around. He can see her through the glass on the cupboards, sees the frown on her face. Disappointment. All familiar.

She sighs, watching him for a moment before she turns and leaves. He doesn’t really move until he hears the door click shut.

He wishes he would’ve bought the fucking meatloaf now.


End file.
